Sleight

Year: 2017
Genre: Drama
Directed: J.D. Dillard
Stars: Jacob Latimore, Seychelle Gabriel, Dule Hill, Storm Reid, Sasheer Zamata, Michael Villar, Brandon Johnson, Cameron Esposito, Andrew Fitzpatrick, Jay Walker, Frank Clem
Production: BH Tilt

Sleight borrows heavily from two very recent and very disparaged movie traditions: the proselytizing social drama and the cheaply made superhero fan film. One has been the last vestige of old-fashioned melodrama, cloaked in an inflated sense of self-importance. The other has a robust life on Youtube sure, but you can't really say that fan films are things of cinematic brilliance - until now.

Well, I suppose there were a few noted exceptions.

Sleight focuses on the life of a young street magician and brilliant engineering prodigy whose mother's untimely death coerces him into a life of petty crime. Bo (Latimore) makes a decent living as a drug dealer, partially because his sleight of hand abilities keeps him out of the clink and partially because his boss Angelo (Hill) has taken him under his smooth talking, business oriented wing.

To say more would constitute spoilers so I'll only say that the movie and specifically its trailer can be blamed for a bit of a bait and switch where the plot is concerned. Those who managed to see the trailer might well be expecting a superhero origin story and not a squalid urban drama. Yet for the majority of the movie that's basically what you get. At first I felt a little, shall we say slighted. But after settling in and ingratiating myself to the characters, the movie's genre-bending plot became something truly new and different.

At the head of it all is the young Jacob Latimore, who's vulnerability and magnetic stage presence as Bo grounds the film, like his Houdini poster centers his bedroom. Every decision the character makes, good and bad (though mostly bad) feels organic and tragically real. Put in a desperate scenario, Bo finds solace in his new girlfriend (Gabriel) his sister (Reid) and his neighbor (Zamata) all of whom try to save him from falling further in a hole of debt and danger. Yet even they fall short; not because of a lack of love or hubris which usually becomes the case in movies like this - but because Bo's desire to just be runs counter to what his world expects from him. Finding no hope in the real, Bo ultimately finds some form of escape in the fantastical, the unexpected, the heroic.

The film's passion really shines through with a vivacious balance of understated drama, familial warmth and staged cleverness. There are only a limited amount of sets and scenes yet with each L.A. club and Bel-Air estate there's a new dimension to everything. It can be said that freshman director J.D. Dillard does more with a two bedroom, one bath house than most directors think to do with an entire sound set.

This wizard right here is your villain.

Of course the film's far from perfect and has some huge problems that would otherwise mar a film of this size and scope. The largest problem stems from the casting of Dule Hill who plays against type as Bo's cutthroat supplier. The script allows him to do some truly despicable things yet his wispy goatee can't hide the fact that the baby-faced actor is far too out of his wheelhouse to seem menacing. Additionally, while the ending is worth the wait overall, one can't help but notice that the emotions become smaller as the set-pieces become bigger.

Sleight is chalked full of  ingredients we've seen before but never together in one movie and certainly not to this extent.  It's an audacious pop experiment. One whose skeletal budget only sells its earnestness. It's the kind of movie that makes me think the future of independent film isn't as dark as it sometimes appears.

Final Grade: B